Don't Look Back
by littlemissscatterbrained
Summary: After Erin leaves Intelligence for the counterterrorism unit in New York City, she's separated from the only real parent she's ever known. Hank, worried about Erin, calls on an old friend to keep an eye out for him.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: I know this isn't the same type of story I usually post, but this idea wasn't going to leave me alone until I wrote it. If I like this 'verse, and if it's generally well received, I might write spin-off stories related to this 'verse but not include them in the main fic, if that makes sense. So let me know what you think of this!**

 **Summary: After Erin leaves Intelligence for the counterterrorism unit in New York City, she's separated from the only real parent she's ever known. Hank, worried about Erin, calls on an old friend to keep an eye out for him.**

 **Disclaimer: I own no part of Chicago PD, Law and Order SVU, or anything else mentioned in this fic.**

" _Benson," the voice on the other end of the is crisp, even that late at night. He figures it's because she caught a case._

" _It's Hank," he says, his voice more gravelly than normal because he's trying to bite back the emotions he's feeling about the last member of his family leaving. He knew it was necessary, sure, but he was never lying when he told her that she brightened his day. "Listen, some stuff went down in Chicago with Lindsay…"_

Erin Lindsay stepped off the plane at JFK Airport and headed towards the baggage claim. She had a two-and-then-some hour flight to think about her choice, or really lack thereof, in leaving Intelligence and joining an FBI unit in New York. Lost in thought, she grabbed a coffee from the airport convenience store and then headed towards the baggage claim. She was still figuring out how to get all her stuff from Chicago to New York, and wanted to put it off as long as possible. She just wanted this all to be a really bizarre dream. So, all she had brought with her was a suitcase with as much of her clothing as she could fit, and a few keepsakes that meant the world to her. Once she had pulled her suitcase off the carousel, she headed towards the exit- she had to take a taxi to… _Oh shit,_ Erin thought, _Where am I staying?_ In the whole mess, she hadn't even thought to book a hotel or-

"Hey Erin," a soft voice pulled her from her worrying, and she looks over towards the source- Olivia Benson, SVU sergeant, was leaning against a pillar nearby the door, smiling softly at the young detective.

"Olivia!" Erin said, briskly walking in her direction and giving her a hug, "It's _so_ good to see you!" She grinned, "What are you doing here? Working a case?"

"No," Olivia said in the same soft tone, "Hank actually called me to tell me what happened, I told him I'd meet you here." She took Erin's hands in hers, "I'm so sorry about what happened."

Erin nodded a little, willing herself not to let the emotions that had been building up the entire flight spill over. "Thanks Olivia," she said, quietly.

"Where are you staying? C'mon, I'll drive you there," Olivia said, gesturing to Erin that she should start following her as she walked out to the car.

"Uh, so that's the thing, in the whole rush of this ordeal I forgot to book a hotel room. So if you know of anywhere with really reasonable prices around here…"

"Nonsense, you can stay with me," Olivia said, having already made up the spare bedroom for Erin since Hank hadn't been able to tell her if his daughter had found somewhere to stay in New York.

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely."

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 _A week after Erin had initially shown up in NYC, she had signed a lease on an apartment and moved in. Olivia had been over for drinks a few times, and noticed that nothing was getting unpacked. The apartment barely looked lived in. And, even though Olivia had only really interacted with Erin in terms of work, she could tell the younger woman wasn't herself. She chalked it up to the transition, but she was growing worried._

" _Voight," a gravelly voice came out of the speaker phone in Olivia's office, which has its door shut and blinds closed._

" _Hey Hank," Olivia said in the soft tone she uses with her victims, and Voight immediately knew that this wasn't about work._

" _Is Erin okay?" he asked, his heart pounding in his chest. He hadn't wanted this to happen, he liked having her in his unit where, even though the danger was very real, he felt like he had some sort of control over it._

" _She's fine, Hank," she listened for the sigh of relief on the other end. "Physically, at least… Mentally, well, I was hoping you could give me some insight."_

" _Go ahead," Voight said, never one to use unnecessary words._

" _Hank, I've seen her apartment. It barely looks lived in. Nothing is unpacked, and I'd be surprised if that's all she had sent over from Chicago. And something else is a little off too, she's just more withdrawn than she normally is. And before you go thinking that it's case related, and she hasn't had time to unpack, I have a friend in her unit who's been complaining about how slow things have been recently."_

 _She could almost feel Hank mulling over the situation in his mind on the other end of the phone. "Okay, so…"_

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The next time Olivia came over to Erin's house for drinks, she decided to take some of the advice Hank had given her over the phone. Though the last few times Olivia had been over she tried to keep the tone lighthearted, this time she knew she had to be serious. Once they were settled down on Erin's couch with glasses of wine (though really, Olivia had no idea if the detective even had a bed or if this couch was the only furniture in the place), she decided to start probing. "So, how's the FBI treating you?" the sergeant asked.

Erin was a little taken aback since usually, Olivia didn't ask so directly about her work. Erin enjoyed the older woman's friendship, and looked up to her, and so it was easy for her to just ask about how SVU was doing and dodge any questions Olivia might have had about her time in the FBI. She thought about how to phrase it so there was no red flags, something that she had, thanks to Bunny, mastered in the third grade. "It's interesting work," she said after a moment of hesitation, "and my coworkers have really varied backgrounds, which is nice for a unit." _It was the same way in intelligence_ , she wanted to add, but didn't want to let on to how homesick she really was. "How has SVU been doing," she added, trying to change the topic.

Unfortunately for the young detective, Olivia's training made it abundantly easy to see right through people, and she caught the half-truths and the attempted distraction. "We've been good, but it's been pretty slow lately. How about you, have you caught any good cases?" Olivia pressed.

"A few little cases here and there, but they were resolved pretty quickly," Erin admitted.

"Did your unit go out for drinks after to celebrate?"

"Yeah, they did," Erin said, and Olivia can sense immediately by the wording that Erin had not joined the rest of her team.

"Not you?"

Erin shook her head and was silent for a moment, "Can we not talk about this anymore," she said, her voice nearly cracking as she gulped down the rest of her drink, and stood up to get more.

Knowing that she couldn't press Erin anymore without the girl breaking down right then and there, she asked one more question. "Have you talked to Hank recently?"

Erin shook her head again, downing the drink she just poured and pouring another. Olivia wanted to cut off the alcohol consumption, but she didn't know Erin all that well, and didn't want to cross a line. After a moment, Erin said, "He told me to go, and not look back on Chicago. I don't think he'd want to hear from me," she shrugged, already halfway through the third drink by the time she sat back down on the couch.

"He's your family, Erin. I don't think he included himself in the 'don't look back' statement." The younger girl shrugged, and Olivia knew she wasn't going to make any more progress, so she flipped the TV on to some meaningless movie and spent the rest of the evening making small talk about things unrelated to Intelligence, FBI, or Hank Voight.

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" _Voight," he said as means of greeting on the phone that had just started to ring. He knew the number, by this point, but still waited for Olivia to start._

" _Erin told me that right before she left Chicago, you told her to never look back. Hank, I think she thought you were including yourself in that statement. That you were sending her off and didn't want to see or speak to her again."_

 _He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He thought that with the fingerprint dog tag, he'd quash the anxiety he knew Erin would have about feeling rejected. Based on her history, he was surprised that she was as well-adjusted as she was, but knew she still had worries of abandonment. Of messing up so badly people would leave, even unintentionally, like in the case of Nadia._

" _Can you pick me up from JFK in three hours? I'm on the next flight out."_

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As per Hank's request, Olivia was at JFK airport when his flight landed three hours after their phone call. He hadn't said anything about bringing Erin, though, and so Olivia was alone when she found Hank by the baggage claim. "It's so nice to see you," she said smiling, and hugged him briefly.

"You too," Hank replied, following Olivia out of the building and into her car.

"So Erin should be at work right now," Olivia said, "But I did insist that she give me a copy of her apartment key in case of emergencies, and I figure you'd like to stay with her tonight so we can swing by her place, drop your bags off, and then go to catch up." Hank nodded his affirmation, and Olivia drove up to Erin's building and parked, then led Hank upstairs and to Erin's door.

Out of courtesy, she knocked on the door first, expecting no response. To her surprise, though, The door opened a sliver and Erin's eyes, puffy and red, met hers.

"Hi Olivia, what's up?" she said in a watery voice, trying so hard to be okay. But the conversation last night had stirred up feelings that she had refused to feel since leaving Chicago, and she had spent the night crying before calling in sick and continuing to cry through the morning. Olivia could tell by the scent of her breath that Erin had been drinking as well, and probably a lot.

"Can you let us in?" Olivia said softly, holding back an _oh, Erin_ and trying hard to refrain from becoming a mother hen.

"Us?" Erin said, opening the door a little further to see who was there besides Olivia. Once Hank came into view, Erin gasped a little, and in the blink of an eye, was hugging the man who was the only real father she had ever known.

"Hey kid," Hank said, and Olivia could tell that behind his gruff exterior, his emotions were threatening to overtake him as well. Once Erin had loosened her grip a little and stepped away, he quickly looked her over- he wasn't thrilled about the alcohol on her breath, and she looked like she had lost a little weight. "Let's go inside, okay?"

Erin nodded, and let the other two into her apartment.

 **AN: I didn't love how this chapter turned out, because I found it so hard to try and write these characters since I feel like I know them so well, and wanted to capture the Erin/Voight relationship perfectly. But please let me know what you thought of it, and if you'd like to continue reading stories in this 'verse!**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Sorry it's been so long. Enjoy the next installment. This is obviously deviating from canon. Short chapter.**

Once Erin let the two parental figures in her life into the apartment, she made her way for the couch in the living room. Seeing as it was the only furniture in the room, Olivia and Hank joined her, bookending the young detective. Taking in the surrounding apartment, and complete lack of personal belongings that adorned the place, he gave a low whistle, "Wow, you really made this place feel like yours," he said sarcastically, watching as Erin ducked her head.

"...isn't home," he heard her mutter under her breath, but left that statement alone for the moment. He pulled her into a hug; Hank Voight was not an affectionate man by any means, but Erin brought out a soft spot in the gruff man.

"I've missed you, kid," he said softly in his gravelly voice.

"Missed you too," Erin replied, before Hank pulled away from the hug and looked her over again. She looked like hell. Her breath reeked of alcohol and it was only mid-day, and he was worried what other habits she might have fallen into. He not-so-discreetly glanced at his daughter's arms, unobscured by her tank top, pleased to find no new track marks. At least she hadn't fallen back into _that_ particular habit.

Erin blushed as she realized what Hank was doing, yanking her arms away and folding them across her chest. "You _really_ don't trust me," she said accusingly to the man she saw as her father. The same man who told her to go to New York and never look back.

"I worry about you," Hank replied, "Erin you look like hell. You look like you've lost weight, never slept, and I'm not pleased at the alcohol I can smell. So forgive me for fearing the worst."

Erin turned her head away, knowing she'd cry if she saw his face; he was using that soft tone of voice that he reserved for kids that got messed up in cases, and for her. Instead, she chose to lash out in anger, "Why do you even care?!" she exclaimed, "You sent me away, told me to not look back, so I didn't. You didn't want me on your team anymore, in your life anymore!" Her voice rose steadily until she was yelling, fury overtaking her and she stood up, strode out of the room to her bedroom, and slammed the door behind her.

"Well, that went well," Hank muttered to Olivia, who had witnessed the entire interaction. She nudged him, pointing in the direction of the bedroom.

"You know, she's looking to see if you follow her, to see if you really care," Olivia explained.

"Of course I care!"

"You and I both know that, but that's the scared teenager you pulled off the streets in there," she said, "not the confident detective. Come on, if she doesn't open the door, I'll help you pick the lock," Olivia said, almost smirking.

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It took all of about two seconds for Erin to open the door once Hank knocked and said, "Erin, kiddo, can you let me in."

She swung the door open, sobbing, and Hank just pulled her into his arms once more. Olivia was right, this was the scared but tough Erin he took off the streets, the one who desperately wanted a parent's love but didn't trust adults. She looked so _young_ without makeup, the weight she lost making her clothes hang off her, and she was the spitting image of her teenage self.

"I'm sorry," she sobbed into Hank's shoulder, "I'm so sorry please forgive me. Please don't leave me…" She said the last part quietly, but Hank still caught it.

"I'm here for you kid," he said, "Never forget that I love you."

Olivia took in the scene around her, she was right- Erin didn't have any furniture besides the couch. "We're definitely going furniture shopping," she muttered to herself, not wanting to break up the family reunion.

The trio ended up back on the couch as Erin sobbed it out once more, both adults offering comfort. It broke both their hearts to see her in such a state.

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A few days later, they had gotten Erin furniture. Hank was insistent on three meals a day, and with her father there to help ease her homesickness, she actually felt up to eating most times, her appetite returned. Hank had stayed at Erin's apartment, even without furniture, and Olivia was there every moment she could be.

Hank was endlessly grateful for Olivia's presence, he could tell the detective was starting to see Erin as a daughter, someone to mother and protect, and that made him feel better about the fact that he couldn't stay in New York forever, he had a job in Chicago to go back to.

He never wanted Erin to question his love for her again, so the two set up a time where they would call each other every week, and Hank vowed to visit as often as he could. When he stepped back on the plane to O'Hare, Erin had tears in her eyes as he tightly hugged her goodbye, promising that he'd see her soon.

"Never forget I love you," He said softly to his daughter, before pulling away from the hug to go make his flight.

"I won't forget," Erin said with a small smile, even though she still looked tearful.

Hank was glad Olivia was there to take Erin back to her apartment, knowing that the woman would care for the younger detective in his absence.

 **AN: I think I'm going to end the story here, but I love the mother/daughter thing Olivia and Erin had going on in the show, and I think I might play with that further in future stories, possibly set in the same 'verse.**


End file.
